THE CLIENT:

In his testimonial year Jamie Carragher decided to create The 23 Foundation and donate all proceeds from events, including his high profile testimonial match at Anfield and celebration black tie dinner, to the Foundation to give it the best financial start he could.

In essence The 23 Foundation encourages the youth of Merseyside to actively reach for their dreams by following their sporting interests. By providing a framework for achieving their goals, the Merseyside community - of which Jamie himself is very much a part of - can develop more confident, well rounded individuals.

In giving children a reason and also the means to express their talents we can show them there are many ways to succeed on a personal and career level by being part of a team. So it’s no surprise therefore that the idea of “we” is a very important part of what The 23 Foundation does, as founder and patron Jamie explains:

"Being part of a team and achieving something together is much more satisfying and I know without the help of my team and teams I grew up with I would not have become the individual I am today. At The 23 Foundation we promote the idea of “we” and “us” because together as a community and with help from people like you reading this, we can accomplish anything."

THE BRIEF:

The Jamie Carragher 23 foundation were looking for an expert merchandise partner that would deliver a world class merchandise solution to create an outstanding range of retail quality, limited edition, testimonial merchandise and accessories that would be sold pre event, on the day of the testimonial event and post event. Also to provide a full retail range into the Liverpool Club shops giving fans the opportunity to purchase over the event and through the online retail shop, as well as providing full audited accounts for all sales post event.

THE RESULTS:

Wild Thang were successful in tendering and proposing a complete solution for this prestige event, working closely with Jamie and The 23 Foundation we designed and developed high impact and relevant graphic designs that really embraced Jamie’s passion on the pitch and off the pitch for The 23 Foundation. Creating a full range of branded clothing and merchandise accessories that really did create the right tone linking to football while maintaining a high retail quality. Once pre-production samples were approved and the manufacturing was complete we delivered agreed stocks to the LFC’s Club shops and warehouse with all relevant barcoding and labelling so it was completely retail ready. The result was the full delivery of a world class testimonial merchandise solution. We also produced a number of additional products such as entry wristbands, staff uniforms, banners, event programmes, marketing material such as posters and backdrops to help market the event, making sure both the testimonial match and black tie dinner had continuity of brand throughout. Merchandise raised circa £35,000 in retail sales on the day of the event. We received a personal thank you letter from Jamie commenting on Wild Thang delivering the very highest of quality solution for branding every aspect of his big testimonial match day.

It’s the Wild Thang way